


Touched

by Pleasant_Boy



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Comfort, Emotional, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Falling In Love, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-01
Updated: 2017-06-01
Packaged: 2018-11-07 13:44:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11060226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pleasant_Boy/pseuds/Pleasant_Boy
Summary: Makoto clung to her, kissing the top of Ann's blonde head, slim arms that had only recently begun gaining muscle wrapped around her. Fiercely. Protectively. As though, if she loved her enough right now, she could undo every past trauma and take away every old hurt.Ann fell for the uptight student council president gradually, by inches—or maybe it was all at once, and she didn't even realize.





	Touched

**Author's Note:**

> This fic mentions Ann's past abuse, but not in explicit detail. Still, be cautious while reading.

It wasn't love at first sight, because, frankly, Ann hated Makoto.

Another girl who thought she was better than her—better than everyone. The worst part was, who was to say Makoto was wrong? Beautiful and intelligent, a perfect, ideal student, able to balance her academics and extracurriculars and never, _ever_ get mixed in with the wrong crowd.

The way Makoto looked down on Ann felt like a real, physical weight on her shoulders. She'd seen that look a hundred times over—the exact moment when someone wrote her off as nothing more than a dumb blonde.

Who died and made her queen, anyway?

* * *

She'd been wrong, of course.

Kaneshiro had threatened Makoto with things Ann spent most nights trying not to think about. He'd threatened her with worse than that, and he could deliver. It didn't matter if his real self wouldn't remember the lecherous promises he made, because here and now, Ann's heart raced and her gut spasmed as her own unwelcome memories played behind her eyelids.

 _I'll make him pay,_ two girls silently promised.

Ann wondered: if she hadn't been chained up when she'd awoken, would she have been able to stay standing the way Makoto did now?

* * *

"Takamaki-san." Makoto's voice was so much gentler than she'd expected. A lot of things about Makoto weren't turning out the way she'd expected. "I wanted to apologize for the way I acted when we first met." A pause to consider her next words carefully—if they'd had this conversation when they'd first met, Ann would have assumed Makoto considered _everything_ too carefully.

Thinking back on the events of the past few days, Ann knew better now.

Makoto tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and looked up from organizing the papers on the table in front of her, a small, apologetic smile on her lips. "The way I acted was... uncalled for. I shouldn't have been so judgmental," she said. "I hope you can forgive me. I'd really like it if we could start over."

"I'd like it too, senpai," Ann replied, offering up a smile of her own.

"Well," Makoto said slowly, as though tasting the words in her mouth before releasing them, "maybe we could start by not being so formal? You can just... call me Makoto if you'd like."

Ann couldn't help the way her grin widened as she quirked an eyebrow. "Not Mako-chan, then?"

Makoto's cheeks flushed and she suddenly became very engrossed in shuffling paper again. "Um... if you think it suits me?" How diplomatic.

"Haha, sorry, I'm just teasing." Friendly teasing, definitely, and if Ann kept doing it, it was just because that was what all the Phantoms did. It had absolutely nothing to do with wanting to watch Makoto blush.

"Then," Makoto said, "Ann-chan." And she laughed quietly, and Ann couldn't help but join in.

"What's so funny?" Ryuji asked as he entered the student council room with Akira at his heels.

"Oh, just girl stuff," Makoto said, flashing Ann a mischievous little smile, two conspiratorial children sharing a precious secret together. Ann held that smile close to her, closer than she realized, and told herself it was because she was the first one who got to see Makoto laugh.

* * *

Makoto never called her hopeless, even when Ann felt completely and utterly convinced that she _was_. Sure, she'd sigh in exasperation when Ann answered a question wrong during their study sessions, and Ann couldn't pretend that didn't sting a little. But it came from somewhere unfamiliar and new—from faith, not disappointment. Faith that she _could_ do better than this. 

Ann knew she could. She would. And not for Makoto although the student council president's pleased smile when she checked over their practice quizzes didn't hurt. Not for anyone in the Phantom Thieves, either, for as much as she loved them.

For the first time in a good, long while, she thought Ann Takamaki might be worth believing in.

* * *

If Akira and Ryuji going to ramen shops together wasn't a date, then certainly Ann and Makoto going to cafes together when the boys were busy wasn't a date either. She treasured their time together, just the two of them. More and more, she found herself hoping Akira would text the group chat to say they didn't need to meet at the hideout that day. 

Spending time with Shiho had been harder than either of them realized. Kamoshida tainted the very air they breathed. When they were together it became a thick, stifling miasma, impossible to ignore even in their desperation to do just that.

"I want to be there for her, and I am, but I—" Ann said one day, looking past Makoto's shoulders, out the cafe window onto the busy street where people kept walking and living and breathing, "I wish we could just... not talk about it... sometimes. But he's—it's always going to be there, isn't it?" An empty approximation of a bitter laugh. "Did he have to take us away from each other too? On top of everything?"

Ann hadn't realized her hands were shaking until Makoto touched them, softness enveloping her, pressing her own palms against the warm teacup she held.

"It will take time," Makoto said. "But you'll go back to being friends like you were before. Maybe not exactly the same, because… you're right. This will always be there. But it won't feel like this forever."

Ann swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded, staring down at their hands through the blurriness of her tears. Makoto's thumbs ran over the ridges of her knuckles, soothing, rhythmic strokes.

"Ann-chan."

Ann looked up. There was that same determination in Makoto's eyes that Ann had seen when she first awakened, but tempered. A flash of something like anger, a touch of something like love.

"It won't feel like this forever," she said again, and Ann believed her.

* * *

The first time they'd kissed in Mementos, Ann thought she might die, but that seemed fine, honestly. Or maybe she was already dead, because Makoto's lips were on hers, and they were somehow both gentle and demanding and even softer than Ann had imagined. 

She stared, dumbly, blue eyes blinking behind her mask. It was easy to tell where Queen ended and Makoto began because it was _definitely_ Makoto who averted her gaze and apologized. Makoto, who flushed scarlet under the sharp metal angles of her knight's mask. Queen, who yelled at her to snap out of it before grabbing her by the shoulders and kissing her.

"Um," Ryuji and Morgana said from several feet away.

"I didn't want to slap you, and I just—it just seemed like you were going to hit Joker, so I—I'm sorry!"

"I'm glad you didn't slap me," Ann said through her fingers.

"Oh." Makoto paused, seemingly unsure how to take that. "Good." Another pause, during which Ann became acutely aware of the boys staring.

"Now that the shadow is dispatched and Panther is well, let's move on, shall we?" Yusuke asked, clearing his throat. "Mona, didn't you say you sensed a safe area nearby?" No sooner had the words left his mouth than he began walking briskly. Akira followed, forcing the others to catch up, which meant they'd stopped gawping. Ann would have to thank Yusuke for that later.

The rest of the day's exploration was uneventful, because for as exciting as hunting down criminals and fighting demons was, Ann hadn't stopped thinking about the way Makoto's lips felt.

* * *

_I wanted to apologize again for what happened today in Mementos. I panicked and didn't want to see you or anyone else hurt. But I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable._

Ten minutes of typing, erasing, typing again, erasing again.

 ~~> It's fine! We can forget it ever~~  
~~> Don't worry about it! I didn't m~~  
> _It's really okay! You didn't make me uncomfortable at all._

_I'm relieved to hear it._

Twelve minutes of silence.

_Is it strange that, even with the unusual circumstances, I'm still happy my first kiss was with you?_

* * *

The Metaverse was what they had together, and Ann was glad, because Kamoshida had never, would never touch Panther the way he'd touched her.

But Queen could, and did, on irresponsible trips to the safe parts of Mementos under the guise of training together. Queen, so gentle and kind, who gasped with a reverence that was impossible to fake the first time Panther unzipped her catsuit.

"You're so beautiful," she'd whispered, like it was another secret they would share.

Even if their time was stolen and illicit, they moved slowly—not that Panther didn't want to go faster. But in spite of—or, likely, because of—Panther's whimpered begging and impatient whines, Queen set their pace to something just shy of unbearable. She was intently laser-focused on learning every new spot on Panther's body. Which way did she have to curl her fingers to make Panther shake like that? Oh, interesting. And what about like this? If she sucked harder instead of using her tongue, would Panther still make those little noises for her? Oh, _very_ interesting.

And when it came to herself, Queen was, fittingly enough for her namesake, tenderly fussy. Panther, try using the flat of your tongue here. It feels amazing when you lick right there, _yes_ , just like that, you're so good at this. There was so much praise Panther wasn't certain she'd ever get used to it. She couldn't imagine not feeling a jolt of electricity run through her whenever Queen stroked her hair and told her what a wonderful girl she was. Always so calm, even on the brink of coming. 

Better still was when Queen held her afterwards, the two of them somehow finding a way to lay in each other's arms on Metaverse metro station benches. Even with her chest rising and falling heavily, Queen always still had the breath to tell Panther how much she loved her.

Half-naked underground in an alternate dimension, Panther never felt safer.

* * *

"Ann? What's wrong?"

"I don't know, I—it's just—it's different."

And it was. Makoto's bedroom was too new, too mundane. It could have been anyone's room in anyone's apartment, but— 

No. Specifically, it could have been _his_ room and he was her only ride home and—

Ann was dimly aware that on the bed beside her, Makoto was moving, going away, and she knew she'd blown it, she'd fucked everything up. She was too hurt and damaged and he'd sunk his claws into her too deeply and now Makoto would realize she was too much trouble and—

"Ann. Look at me. Can you take deep breaths for me?"

And Makoto had only moved off of her bed to throw her shirt back on. She held Ann's face in her hands, and she was sitting on the bed—her bed, it was Makoto's bed and this was Makoto's room—right beside her.

Ann breathed in. Clean sheets, and hints of a flowery soap, and a little sweat. Ann breathed out. Makoto's concerned expression, her knit brow and slight frown turned into abstract shapes through Ann's tears. She breathed in. Makoto's hands moved down to hers, thumb tracing her knuckles again. She breathed out. Makoto stayed.

"Can I hold you?" Makoto asked when Ann's shuddering exhales had steadied.

"Please."

Makoto clung to her, kissing the top of Ann's blonde head, slim arms that had only recently begun gaining muscle wrapped around her. Fiercely. Protectively. As though, if she loved her enough right now, she could undo every past trauma and take away every old hurt.

"You're safe," Makoto said, over and over, petting her hair. "We have you. All of us do." Another kiss on her hair, messy from interrupted sex, smelling like artificial fruit. "You're so strong, Panther."

Saying her code name outside of the Metaverse felt like a spell, though Ann couldn't say why. A spell to calm her and keep her and make her believe that yes, she was safe, and yes, she was strong. The Ann here now, crying in Makoto's arms at the unbidden memory of an unwanted touch, was the same as Panther in the Metaverse, who had brought Kamoshida to justice when no one else would.

It helped to remember.

Ann allowed herself to cry.

**Author's Note:**

> me: I should write some fluffy fun lesbian porn after all my wangsty Akechi/Akira fic  
> me:  
> me: fuck


End file.
